After the 1943 armistice, he remained faithful to the King Vittorio Emanuele III and fought the Nazis as a liberal partisan.

Financed by his friend and former Fiat president, Gianni Agnelli, the boat competed under the patronage of the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda.

[2] During his life Croce assembled a unique collection of Yacht Portrait Paintings from 1800, which adorned the walls of his house in Portofino, where he also owned the Hotel Splendido.

His family later donated to the Galata Museo del Mare more than 100 paintings from such collection, which are now permanently displayed at the museum's Beppe Croce Gallery.

[3] Married to Countess Umberta Raggio, Croce had three sons, Luigi, Carlo and Manuela and several grandsons and great-grandsons.